Daily sprints….

Just when you think that my workout schedule is insane, I’ve decided to add quick daily sprints before each workout. I’m going to do the same sprints daily, changing them weekly to increase my speed and endurance. I found them on the T Nation website and they look pretty solid so I though what’s the harm.

Warm-up: Jump on the treadmill, for a 3 minute warm up at 5.5, or your comfortable warm-up treadmill pace. Make sure you increase the incline to 1.5-2 as otherwise you’re running at a decline.

The sprints: Jack up the treadmill to 10 (or the fastest pace you can maintain) for the sprints.In the list below, the first number is the number of seconds for the sprint, followed by the number of seconds to rest before the following sprint. I don’t change the pace between sprints and rests, I put my hands on the bars and jump my legs on the side during the rest, keeping the treadmill going at the sprint speed.

The 6 week sprint plan is:

Week 1: 20/10 10/20 15/15 20/10 10/10 10/50

Week 2: 20/10 10/20 15/15 15/15 15/15 10/50

Week 3: 20/10 15/15 15/15 15/15 15/15 10/50

Week 4: 20/10 20/10 10/20 10/20 15/15 15/45

Week 5: 20/10 20/10 10/20 15/15 15/15 15/45

Week 6: 20/10 20/10 15/15 15/15 10/20 20/40

A little extra: If you’re really keen, you can slow it down to 3/4 on the treadmill, turn up the incline to 10/11 and walk for 10 – 15 minutes for extra fat burning. Just make sure to keep your hands off the handles, you’re cheating yourself out of a great workout by holding on.

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14 comments on “Daily sprints….”

Be careful if you are not bringing the speed of the treadmill back down to a safe pace to jump back on. I think I know why you do it if you only sprint for 20 seconds at a time but at a 10.0 pace it can be tricky for anyone to climb back on. The one thing I always did to increase my speed for races, similar to this, was something called Interval training where you run 400 or 800 yards at targeted pace and then jog the same amount, then run, then jog and so on. The big difference, besides being outdoors, is you are forced to run full out for 70 seconds or 3 minutes, based on the length of your interval, which really challenges your breathing. The goal for this training would be to run a total of 400 & 800 combinations to total a 5k length; in essence running a 5k at an 800 pace. It always had great results for bettering my race times. Good luck with your training!…yes running on the beach is a good workout too (pic) Good job!

I completely agree with you! I hold myself on my hands until my feet are running at the same speed as the treadmill but you’re right, it can be quite tricky if you’re not used to it.

I’ve planned track sprints on Wednesdays, and was planning to start with 100 and 200 meter sprints, but I’ll definitely look to increase the lengths and work to 5km at an 800 pace. How much rest are you taking between the sprints to be able to maintain the pace?

If I run a 400 I’ll jog a 400. If I run an 800 I still probably jog a 400. If you haven’t checked yet the running magazine Runners World has a web site with some great info on this. http://www.runnersworld.com/ It helps you target a good pace based on how fast you run a mile I think. Lots of other great running, training and racing tips too. It used to be if you subscribed to the mag they would send you a nice training journal too as a gift…no I do not work for them : )

But I was thinking more about hopping on a treadmill at 10.0. Very trick Alex.. Have you considered running for maybe 30 seconds sprinting but hiking it up to 10 from maybe a 6.0? In the end their is no best way I think, just challenge yourself, accomplish it and move the goal up. Being an athlete I know you know this. I’m looking forward to hearing about your races. Have you done some before?

I like your approach. I’ve always read that you walk/jog your recovery for the same distance as the sprints but I agree that anything over 400 is too long of a break. I’ll take a look at the Runners World link too! Feel free to recommend any sites that you’d like, I promise to recommend that they pay you for advertising if I buy anything from them 🙂

While I haven’t flown off the treadmill yet, the more I do these the more they don’t make sense to me. Firstly, the hopping on and off isn’t exactly realistic in any activity that I would do. Secondly, I find that the time I’m running is extremely short so I’m not sure it’s helpful so I’m inclined to add 5 seconds to the beginning and end of each sprint to allow for the increase/decrease on the treadmill.

I’m going to give them a few more days before I change them just to be sure I’ve given them a fair try. Thank you for your feedback!

So I haven’t run sprints since high school and might be missing something here but do you just do one rep of the week’s schedules? It probably seems easier than it is and I will try it soon but if I’m reading it right you sprint/rest for just over 3 minutes in week 1?

Yes it’s just one rep. It seemed pretty easy to me too so I did two reps but my legs are killing me today so I’d say stick with the one rep. Once you’re done, put the treadmill at speed 3-3.2 and walk up an incline (up to 10 if you can) for 15 minutes. Just make sure you keep your hands off the railings when you’re walking!

As you’ll see in my post, I mentioned that this was a T-Nation workout and link to his page. Don’t worry I don’t try to pull anything off as my own creation but strongly believe in highlighting workouts that I’ve found that work for me.